American opera singer Deanne Brown travels throughout Germany with a troupe of volatile, multinational opera performers. When Jewish contralto Anna Szabo is murdered, suspicion falls on Anna's best friend, Katalin Kalman, the prima donna of the company. The two young women were fighting just before Anna was killed. Deanne begins to suspect that the root of conflict between the two friends might be hidden in the past - their families lived in the same tiny village outside Budapest during World War II. Deanne goes to Hungary and uncovers ancient enmities - enmities that re-emerge in her own opera troupe in unexpected places.